Slipping Away
by Picture Magpie
Summary: Oneshot. Waking up in the hospital, Naruto finds that his latest suicide attempt was foiled by the one person he never wanted to find out. Minor SasuNaru hints. Rated for attempted suicide.


As the gentle hum of machines reached his ears, he instantly knew it hadn't worked. Again. She always found a way to keep him chained to this hell, this thing she called life. He wasn't alive though. Yes, his heart beat, but his soul had long since blacked and turned to dust.

"Naruto?" someone whispered. He slowly opened his eyes to the scene he had witnessed too many times before. Tsunade-baba sat in the chair next to his bed, gently holding his hand in her own. She was crying again and he felt bad for it. She always tried so hard to keep him here, with her, and he just kept trying to leave.

"Why?" she choked out. He turned away. The clouds floated past his window, on a lazy adventure of their own.

"It hurt's" he whispered. She knew he was not talking about his body; the demon sleeping inside of him would always heal any wounds inflicted on his flesh. But his mind? Even the great Kyuubi's powers couldn't reach there.

He turned his eyes back towards her, watching the tears cascading down her beautiful face. How could something as pure as water hold so much pain? So much sorrow? He knew it hurt her, broke her, every time he slit his wrists and mutilated his tender skin. But he kept doing it again, and again, and again. He was addicted and always did it hoping his eyes would stay closed this time. They never did. And that's what broke him.

"How did you find me?" Naruto asked, truly curious. He had taken special care in finding a secluded spot this time.

"Sasuke" She said plainly. His eyes widened in shock. He had never wanted Sasuke to find out, never wanted any of his 'friends' to find out. Naruto had hoped that after he died they would always remember him by the mask he wore, not the weak, pitiful, child he really was. But not anymore. Sasuke would tell his secrets and laugh at his weakness. Oh, Sasuke must think it great fun to know what Naruto really was. This twisted creature pretending to be human.

"He was tracking you because you were acting strange earlier" Tsunade continued. Naruto cursed under his breath, how could he have been so stupid as to not sense Sasuke's presence? The one person he knew inside out. He should have sensed him before he got within a mile of where Naruto was. The excitement of leaving must have clouded his judgment. His mask always started slipping when he was around Sasuke. He was too comfortable around his best friend for his own good. Sasuke was his most important person, even if Naruto loathed having attachment to something that would just leave him in the end. They always did.

Tsunade leaned over to his small frame to embrace him. She held him for longer then necessary, like trying to remember a dream as it slowly slips away from you. She stood up, brushing the hair out of my eyes as she did.

"I love you," She said wiping the tears from her eyes as she turned and headed towards the door. She'd be back. She always came back, following her carefully constructed script. Life was a long, drawn out play, always ending in sorrow.

_Pffftt_ thought Naruto _Like_ _he was really going to buy tickets to that show_.

But when she opened the door, there was something that wasn't normally part of their play. On the other side of the door stood Uchiha Sasuke. He slipped around Tsunade and headed into the hospital room. Tsunade watched for only a second before stepping out of the room and closing the door with a dull thud.

Naruto immediately pretended to be asleep when he saw who was at the door.

"I know your awake, dobe" Sasuke said from the side of Naruto's bed, sitting in the seat that the Godaime had just occupied.

Naruto cursed his luck, even though he knew it would have been a long shot. Oh well, he could always dream. Opening one eye he stared at his best friend, trying to read his body language. It was proving difficult.

"What?" mumbled Naruto rudely, turning to look outside the window again. When in doubt, look away. Words to live by.

"Why?" whispered Sasuke, in a voice laced with an emotion Naruto couldn't quite place. Tuning to look at him, Naruto was shocked to see the look on the Uchiha's face. Naruto knew that emotion all to well; it was the emotion his face betrayed every time he looked in the mirror. It was helplessness.

"Because I'm broken," he whispered so quietly he wasn't sure Sasuke had heard, but feeling he had a right to know any way. "Because I'm so empty with nothing to fill me".

Sasuke stayed quiet for a long time, his own mask slowly slipping off until it fell to the floor and shattered. He reached over and stroked Naruto's cheek, shaking the blond boy to his very core. No one had ever touched him like this, never like this.

"Let me be the one to fill you," murmured Sasuke, pulling Naruto close to his chest. Naruto sat rigid and scared, until what Sasuke had said sunk in. Who would have guessed that those eight little words were the very ones Naruto needed so badly to hear? Naruto relaxed, relieved that his friend was not going to leave him, and began to cry, letting out all the secret pains he had been hiding from the world. His mask slipped off to join Sasuke's on the floor. Maybe there was a reason to stay here after all.

Godaime stood knowingly outside the door, a lopsided smirk on her face.


End file.
